


sanctuary and pride; a guide to feeling out of place

by dupesoclock



Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Genre: Drinking buddies..., M/M, Pride, pre-release borderlands 3 fic, this makes no sense but ive been thinking about them so like My City Now
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-18
Updated: 2019-06-18
Packaged: 2020-05-14 11:04:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19271989
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dupesoclock/pseuds/dupesoclock
Summary: ~ As authored, illustrated, conceptualised and edited by Rhys Strongfork, CEO and wartime general of Atlas Corporation, and ally to the Crimson Raiders.--After years of fighting to get to the top of the food chain, Rhys could finally find himself sitting on a pile of gold among people just like him. But still, something felt... off. Lonely. And not just because he's stuck on a ship in the middle of space.





	sanctuary and pride; a guide to feeling out of place

**Author's Note:**

> hye its midnight this has been sat in my drafts for like two weeks i dont care anymore i don't CARE i dont care
> 
> you may call me ax and i am what you call a dragon. and like dragons, i hoarde shit. my shit is rarepairs. thank you goodnight i love men
> 
> back on my bullshit all the time. rhys and axton are bi LEGENDS dont look at me
> 
> gonna have a longer fic w/ them soon i promise im juts hgghgnhn boys. boy energy. mlm vibes.
> 
> im very tired

Saying that the night around him was in full swing wouldn’t be exactly wrong, but it wouldn’t be entirely right, either. Moxxi’s bar had been packed for hours with the bodies of the Crimson Raiders, both Vault Hunters and allies - new and old - each of them contributing to the sea of white noise and occasional karaoke that washed over the crowds that pushed and shoved and even attempted a bar fight (the old operative and girl with the mech were rather… excitable) once or twice. But even amongst the sea of chaos, amongst new found friends, Rhys found himself sitting at the bar, drinking glass half empty as he tapped near the top of it with his cybernetic hand, metal against crystal creating a quiet ‘ting’ that was quickly drowned out among the noise around him.

 

It’s not that he didn’t feel safe here. If that had been the case, he would have never have come - besides, Lorelei was here for his protection, though she herself was lost among the crowd, wearing a flag as a cape for the proud occasion. And it’s not that he didn’t trust these people… though there were still seeds of doubt, Rhys knew that they were good people, especially for ones who had spent a majority of their time among the commonwealths of Pandora… he glanced over to the leader of the Raiders, a powerful siren with firey red hair and painted stripes of pink, blue and purple across her cheeks as she wrapped her arms around a girl with bunny ears and a gap-toothed grin stood beside her, each with a drink in hand. Lilith wasn’t a good person, but she was loyal to her cause, and he could respect that. It was more so that he was… lonely.

 

In Hyperion, he could count on Vaughn and Yvette to have his back at these kinds of gathering, though they tended to be a lot more… drab and dull than something like this, ones where they, as lowly workers, would often hand at that back and sip a glass throughout the night while Henderson went on and on, unaware they were talking about how much things wouldn’t suck if they were sat in his chair. On Pandora, while they never really got to party while getting shot at or running around or… getting shot at some more, Fiona and Sasha would be there for further company, and though they were prickly and Pandoran (and he meant that in the nicest way possible, of course) they always made time to make the long caravan rides some kind of fun with their tales of grandeur played off of one another. But now, as he stared into his drink after glancing behind him (catching the eye of his hired compatriot Zer0, who had taken to kneeling down while flowers of yellow, purple and white were donned on their head by an excitable redhead, who quickly slapped their back thereafter in glee), the fact that neither of these parties were with him had become even more aware than before, in the years after leaving the Vault of the Traveller and the second rise of Atlas under his leadership.

  
  


He swirled the last of his glass around before sighing into it and taking a slow drink. This was just pointless, philosophical waxing at this point - things were as they were, and while he would think on how things could have been different if he went about things differently in the choices that he made, there was no point wishing to do it, as much as he wanted to. Besides, he would rather be sat here than still on Pandora, or as some… meat puppet for Hyperion. 

 

As the night went on, the party died down into silence, and one by one individual began to trickle into the ship’s many quarters, whether they be permanent residences or otherwise. Lorelei had stopped by to give him a pat on the shoulder, blue lipstick staining her cheek as she checked on him, and told him how her door was open - ever the rock to lean on, she was - before leaving with a tired spring to her step. Rhys looked over his shoulder to watch him leave, before turning back to face the bar, catching the owner’s eye who smiled at him rather sadly, before grabbing another bottle and topping up his almost empty glass. He mouthed a thank you as she finished, and placed it on the countertop.

“I can tell you’re waiting for someone, sugar. I’m sure he’s on his way.”

“Ah, yeah. Thanks.”

She nodded, before turning to the other side of the bar away from him to clean away confetti and streamers from the countertop, leaving him to stew in his drink again. He could only hope she was right.

 

And sure enough, after a few minutes of silence while listening to tired, muffled music hit the beat, there was the sound of heavy footfalls echoed at the large archway of the bar. They were louder over the weak pulse of music, and loud enough to cause Rhys to look behind him and pause for a moment before he began to smile. The man standing there to catch his breath was unmistakable - tall, handsome, with his hands and arms dirty with… well, dirt, possibly blood. As he stood to his full height and ran a hand through his hair, one hand moving to grab the framework of the door, he stopped for a second to catch sight of Rhys sat at the bar, to which a grin spread across his face, and he tightened the sleeves of his jumpsuit tied around his waist as he slowly made his approach.

“Hey, peaches,” Axton placed a hand down on the bar and leaned, smirking down at Rhys who had turned to meet him.

“Good evening.”

“Woah, hey, what’re you so formal for? ...S’cos I’m late?”

He could barely stop himself from laughing. “Maybe so.”

“Ha, sure. Sorry, I’ll try not to get killed so hard on my way here next time, Your Royalness.” Playful sarcasm dripped from his lips as he slowly took a seat besides Rhys at the bar, pulling down his goggles down from the top of his head to let them rest around his neck. “You doin’ OK?”

“Yeah, yeah, just… CEO stuff. You know… war with Maliwan and all that.” He almost laughed - among the chaos here in Sanctuary that evening, he’d almost forgotten about the issues back home on Promethea. Almost.

“Ah, damn. Companies suck, huh.” Axton pauses for a moment to look over and ask for a drink, before he quickly froze and looked back over to Rhys… who was, of course, still mostly clad in Atlas uniform, despite the occasion. “-Uh, ‘cept of course, yours.”

“Mm.” He hummed, before chuckling into his drink, taking a sip of it and cringing slightly - it was warm, room temperature from sitting there all night practically untouched - before looking back. The soldier was still talking to Moxxi, who was in the slow process of taking down decorations, hers or otherwise, that were hanging from the bar. Drink still pressed against his lips, he smiled, just as Axton looked over again.

“...What?”

“Oh, nothing, just,” Rhys put his glass back against the countertop and reached a hand out slowly to Axton’s face, cupping the cheek that was facing him and gently running his thumb across it, picking up on the dried blood that stained there. He moved his hand away and rubbed his fingers between each other, as Axton paused and blinked before rubbing the same cheek with the back of his hand. “You don’t know how to clean after yourself, is all.”

“Can’t blame a guy for bein’ in a rush when there’s a celebrity, can you?” He almost pouted as he moved his hand away from his face, cheeks dusted lightly with a shade of pink in embarrassment as Rhys laughed again, covering his mouth as he almost snorted.

“Well, I guess it wouldn’t be you, otherwise.”

Axton laughed quietly, nodding a little as he did, catching a glass half full as it slid down to him with one hand. “Right, right.”

 

In the few moments of almost silence that followed, Rhys looked over and watched this small glass slide from one hand to the other in an idle need for the soldier to be doing something with his hands - a trait he noticed quite often, in fact - before moving a hand of his own to gentle hold Axton’s wrist, causing him to pause and look up for a moment, their eyes meeting. They’d first met at his lowest point - everything Rhys thought he knew was gone with the crash of Helios, he was cold and alone in the ruins of the ship before he was found and taken in by the Raiders, despite the Hyperion label on his chest. It was comfort, and solitude in dark times. It was nice. They were nice.

 

They stared in silence for a moment, before Axton gently cocked his head to the side and opening his mouth to say something idiotic, probably. But he really didn’t need to, nor did Rhys really want him to, - or give him a chance to, for that matter.

Without another word, the CEO turned to his side and leaned forward for a kiss, perhaps a little too fast as he almost fell out of his chair if it hadn’t have been for Axton sitting right beside him to catch him with a quiet laugh.

“You been drinkin’ a little too much there, huh?” He helped Rhys sit upright to catch his embarrassed frown, not moving his hands off his shoulders.

“Well, if I wasn’t on my own-”

“Oh come on, I said sorry!”

“I know, I know.”

Axton paused for a moment, before gently and almost deliberately taking care to pull Rhys forward and place a soft kiss on his forehead, before wrapping his arms around him in a tight hug. “Well, if it means anythin’, I’m proud of you, Rhys.”

For a moment, neither of them moved, before slowly Rhys returned the hug with a soft squeeze, burying his face into Axton’s shoulder with a small, soft smile.

 


End file.
